Wednesday, December 30, 2020

Rant 4

 Adding an improvement to an existing system without shutting off the old way is a classic mistake.  Mature teams and leadership make it a point to replace, not append. 

If you don't have the obligation to be backward compatible, consider yourself lucky enough to be able to shut off the "old way".  In fact, the "new way" should not be considered complete until the old way is completely gone.

Ask yourself, when is the last time you truly decommissioned a component of your technology stack?  If users have multiple ways to achieve the same workflow, this is a smell.

This typically stems from inability to measure the usage of your product.  You're afraid to take something away, because some user might scream that their cheese was moved.  You should know whether or not it's in use with some basic logging and instrumentation.  If you don't have that, then get it.  

Code is not an asset.  Code is a liability. Strive to reduce liabilities. Your users will adapt. 


No comments:

Post a Comment